


Birds: a Raven and a Sparrow

by Odile (Odileheroin_e)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Character Study, Gen, which is to say that there is no actual plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-14
Updated: 2013-07-14
Packaged: 2017-12-20 04:58:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/883208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Odileheroin_e/pseuds/Odile
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A raven and a sparrow: neither of them is what they look like.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Birds: a Raven and a Sparrow

**Author's Note:**

> My first fic in English, yay. This is a peculiar one, because it started from the character(?) of Teacup and it sort of moved on from there and merged with something I had been thinking of writing earlier. So it's a kind of hybrid. (Hy-bird.) 
> 
> This isn't something that I'm very keen on continuing. I might add chapters if I get inspired, but I don't think of this as a long, story-oriented fic, really.

A sparrow sits on the window sill and stares outside. It is a rather odd sparrow, and not only in that it sits on the wrong side of the window (that is to say that it is _inside_ the room) but also in that it has a blue ribbon around its neck. And on that blue ribbon, there is a tiny, tiny porcelain teacup that makes a chinking noise every time the bird moves and its peculiar accessory touches its chest.

But there is an explanation to this phenomenon. The bird's name is Teacup, and the odd clicking of his identifying necklace comes from the fact that this bird was once a teacup. And a very fine one, with handpainted violets the same colour as his ribbon. But now it is a bird, a bird (imaginatively) named Teacup. He was enchanted to life by Rosalinda Voron four years ago in Transfiguration class, and even though he made the chinking sound he received something of a smile from Professor McGonagall. (Fortunately for his owner, McGonagall never checked a certain other thing about him that might have docked some points from Rosalinda's performance.) Seeing that McGonagall was content with him, she kept Teacup. He was a perfectly fine piece of spellwork, and such a cute bird, too! And nevermind that, McGonagall had everyone bring their own teacups. Why would Rosalinda leave behind something as precious as her handpainted cup?

That being so, Teacup has lived for little over four years, an usually long time for a sparrow. Now, we should bear in mind that Teacup was once a teacup and that there was something about Rosalinda's spellwork that might have left Professor McGonagall unsatisfied. That little detail would be that Teacup is just as long-lived as his origin, a cup of porcelain. This is both a good and a bad thing: Rosalinda keeps having trouble with repairing scratches and cracks he gets daily, but even if he breaks, a simple Reparo will bring him to life again. 

And there she comes, looking for her best friend. 

Rosalinda is a Ravenclaw, so a pet bird suits her wonderfully, even more so than her surname. Her family is Russian, pure blood witches and wizards each. Unfortunately for them, they are also Muggle-sympathetic, so Rosalinda's application to Durmstrang was denied. So here she is, in Hogwarts, explaining everyone who still dares to approach her that she bears no relation to Rowena Ravenclaw, _why should you think so?_ It's just the damn name, yes, Russian for "raven", not "Ravenclaw"! How hard can it be to understand the difference? 

"There you are. Come on now."

Teacup takes flight and perches himself on Rosalinda's shoulder. 

"Dying to go out, are you?"

She sighs. It is in a bird's nature (even if he is a teacup), yearning for freedom, but that particular desire of the bird's she can't possibly fulfill. It is far too dangerous: what if Teacup would happen to fly too far away and scatter outside the grounds? Oh no, better to have him stretch his wings inside the castle. Filch doesn't like it too much, but Teacup is swifter than a Snitch and Filch could never dream of catching him. 

It is not only the fact that she has a teacup-bird with her wherever she goes that makes the whole school avoid her. The students, that is, not the teachers. The teachers are, she is almost sad to confess, her only company in the school, apart from Teacup. Not that she'd _want_ to make friends with the other students. If they don't want to have anything to do with her, why should she want to have anything to do with them? That's all there is to it. She has a reputation of a possibly deranged bird-woman and goes by the nickname "the Grey Raven", at least in the house of Slytherin. She's "grey" because she is a couple of years older than the other seventh-years, and that is because her family had to move to Britain to get her education. She started in Hogwarts at fourteen and only two months away from her fifteenth birthday, which means that she already has spent many years as an adult witch. So, compared to the pups of Hogwarts, she is... _old_. 

Rosalinda isn't actually deranged, in any way. She simply has the talent of making friends with those who actually _want_ to be friends with her. The rest she frankly doesn't care about. Why sacrifice thoughts of worry to those who don't care about her, why pity herself for not having them for company? Rubbish. They might be right when they call her "old", they are most definitely wrong to call her "deranged" but there might be some truth to the claim that she is cold. 

But she is also a very talented witch. Transfiguration and Charms are her fields of specialisation, in the rest of the subjects she manages. (In the Ravenclaw-sense of the expression.) The teachers trust her and despite her bad reputation among fellow students she was even flashed the possibility of becoming Head Girl. Well, she is not Head Girl now, but what is that worth, any way? A lot of extra work. Like there isn't enough with trying to find a better protection spell for Teacup. 


End file.
